Experimental home made muesli bars

I know a few people who rave about American muesli bars called Larabars. In between the wistful sighs and blatant cravings, you'll hear three reasons for loving them:

• they taste like magical crack-smothered fairies oozing love hearts and rainbows of deliciousness.
• they're diary free, soy free, kosher, and gluten free (in all probability they can wash your dishes, do your taxes, and perform citizen's arrests).
• there's only 6 ingredients in each bar.

Unfortunately they're horribly expensive and tricky to get over here, so people try and make their own versions instead. This is where The Third Reason of Love comes in; because there are so few ingredients, all you need to do is fiddle around with quantities and combos and you've virtually stolen the patent.

Since I'm gently wandering along the border of Health Kickdom, I figured I would try and make some of these faux-bars as a replacement for chocolate bars when Three Thirty-itis strikes. There are a bunch of recipes around, but I ended up using this one. They're pretty easy to make, have a go!

A few notes:

• Fresh dates are hard to find in New Zealand. Instead, get whole dried dates from the supermarket and soak them for a few hours first. I didn't soak mine and ended up with really crumbly bars.
• Half an ounce is approximately 12.5 grams.

I'll let you know how mine turn out (and whether the gentle wander turns into a midnight dash).